by Marc Levy
But Alice only had eyes for the Selmer. It made her think of Anton, whom she remembered had admired a model much like it. He had stood for what seemed like hours gazing through the window of a shop in Battersea like a motorcar enthusiast lusting after a Jaguar convertible. Anton had taught her a great deal about trumpets: the difference between the models, their keys, valves, and pistons, the various patinas and finishes, and the different alloys that could have an effect on the sound of the instrument.
“I can sell it to you for a reasonable price,” offered the shopkeeper.
Can said a few words in Turkish.
“A very good price,” he corrected. “Can’s friend is my friend. I will even give you a case.”
Alice paid the salesman and left the shop with her purchase.
Daldry was skeptical. “I didn’t know you were a trumpet expert,” he said, following her. “You looked like you knew what you were doing.”
“You don’t know everything about me,” said Alice teasingly.
“Well, I’ve certainly never heard you play, and Lord knows, I would if you did.”
“And you still insist that you don’t play the piano?”
“I told you, it’s the woman downstairs. So what is it? You practice under railway arches to avoid bothering the neighbors?”
“I thought you were hungry, Daldry.” She stopped in front of a restaurant. “This place doesn’t look half bad.”
Can went into the restaurant ahead of them and managed to get a table in spite of the queue of customers waiting to be seated.
“Are you a shareholder in the Bazaar, or is it that your father owns the entire place?” asked Daldry as they sat down.
“Just a guide, Your Excellency.”
“I know, I know. ‘The best in Istanbul.’”
“I’m thrilled to hear you finally say so. Let me order. Our time is limited and you have a meeting soon.”
Can approached the counter.
9
The consulate had reassumed its everyday appearance. The elaborate flower arrangements were gone, the crystal had been packed away, and the ballroom doors were closed.
Alice and Daldry showed their papers to a uniformed officer, who took them to the second floor, where they walked down a long corridor and waited for a secretary to call them.
Not long afterward, they entered the consul’s office. He had an austere appearance, but a pleasant voice.
“Miss Pendelbury, I gather you’re a friend of His Excellency’s wife.”
Alice turned and looked at Daldry quizzically.
“Not me,” said Daldry. “The real one.”
“Oh yes, quite,” said Alice to the consul.
“You must be rather close indeed for her to have asked for this appointment on such short notice. How might I be of service?”
Alice explained her request to the consul as he continued his work, signing and initialing a series of official documents in a leather portfolio.
“Supposing, Miss Pendelbury, that your parents asked for an official visa, it would be more likely that you would find the information you’re looking for in the archives of the old Ottoman regime, not with us. Before the Republic of Turkey was founded in 1923, this consulate used to be our embassy, but I see no reason why the papers you are looking for would have found their way here. Only the Turkish foreign minister might have something in his archives that would interest you, but even supposing that such minor paperwork has been kept, I highly doubt that they would undertake such complicated research on behalf of a private party.”
Here Daldry interjected. “Unless, perhaps, the British Consulate contacted the Turkish authorities and made it clear that the request came from a close personal friend of the British Ambassador’s wife. You might be surprised at what the desire to please an ally and economic partner can do to lift administrative roadblocks. I know from personal experience. One of my uncles on my father’s side is a close advisor to our Foreign Secretary. I’m sure he’d be glad to hear about your efficient assistance in this matter.”
The consul looked up from his work. “I understand entirely, Mr. Daldry. I’ll be in touch with the Turkish authorities and I’ll do my best to get an answer for you. Still, I wouldn’t be too optimistic if I were you. It strikes me as highly unlikely that they would have kept something so simple as a visa request for such a long time. You said, Miss Pendelbury, that your parents might have come to Istanbul sometime between 1900 and 1910?”
“Yes, that’s right.” Her face had flushed a particularly deep shade of red during Daldry’s bald-faced lie.
“Enjoy your stay in Istanbul. It’s a wonderful city. If I hear anything back from the Turks, I’ll send a message to your hotel.” He rose and showed them to the door. Alice thanked him for his time.
“I suppose your uncle must also be named Daldry, if he’s your father’s brother, isn’t that so?” asked the consul, shaking Daldry’s hand.
“No, actually, it’s not,” said Daldry, remaining composed. “As an artist, I chose to take my mother’s maiden name because it seemed much more original at the time. My uncle’s name is Davies, as was my father’s.”
Alice and Daldry left the consulate and returned to the hotel to take the tea that the consul never got around to offering them.
“Is Daldry really your mother’s maiden name?” she asked, settling into a chair.
“Not at all. But chances are that you’ll find a Davies or two in every branch of the government.”
“You really aren’t afraid of anything, are you?”
“You ought to be congratulating me. We made out rather well.”
The Karayel, a cold wind from the Balkans, began to blow as evening fell, bringing with it a snowstorm that effectively ended the unusually mild winter Istanbul had been enjoying that year. When Alice woke up the following morning, the pavement was as white as the percale curtains hanging on either side of her window, and the roofs of Istanbul looked no different than those she had left behind in London. The snowstorm continued throughout the day, keeping people indoors and nearly obscuring the view of the Bosporus. After eating breakfast in the hotel dining room, Alice went back to her room and sat at the desk, where she had developed a habit of writing a letter nearly every evening.
Dear Anton,
Winter has struck and given us an excuse to take a break from touring the city. I met the British consul here yesterday, but he didn’t leave me feeling very optimistic about my chances of finding out whether my parents ever came here. I think about them all the time. I often wonder whether it was the fortune-teller’s predictions or the dream of discovering a new fragrance that took me away from London. Perhaps it was you. If I’m writing you, it’s because I miss you. Why did I hide my feelings? Maybe I was afraid of putting our friendship at risk. When my parents died, you were one of the few remaining links to my past. I’ll never forget the letters I received from you every week during the long years that I lived with my aunt.
I wish you’d write me letters again so that I could read about what’s new in your life and know how you pass your days. I’m having a wonderful time. Daldry sometimes acts like a spoiled child, but he’s a gentleman at heart. And Istanbul continues to be a beautiful, fascinating place. Today I found something in the Bazaar that I think you’ll like very much. That’s all I’ll tell you for now . . . I’ve sworn to myself that I’ll manage to keep a secret for once. When I come home, we’ll go for a walk along the Thames and you’ll play . . .
Alice paused for a moment and chewed on the tip of her pen. She scribbled out the last sentence until it was illegible.
. . . we’ll walk along the Thames and you’ll tell me everything that happened while I was away.
Don’t think I’ve come all this way just to be an idle tourist. My ideas for a new perfume are also coming along, or rather, I’ve got ideas for several different projects. The next step, as soon as I have some time, is to visit the spice market. Last night, I decided to create a series of fragrances
for people’s homes. I know it’s not a completely new idea, but this particular variation is promising, and it came to me thanks to the perfume maker I told you about in my last letter.
As I was falling asleep last night, I thought about my parents, and each memory was linked to a scent. I’m not talking about my father’s cologne or my mother’s perfume, but other things, like the smell of a leather satchel, of chalk dust and hot chocolate. It always smelled like cinnamon in our house when my mother was baking. She put it in nearly all of her desserts. And when I think back to the winters of my childhood when we went out to the countryside, I can smell the firewood my father collected in the forest and burned in our fireplace. In late spring there were the wild roses he gave to my mother, filling the sitting room with their fragrance. Mother always knew about my interest in and sensitivity to smells, but I never explained to her how odors mark every minute of my life and form a sort of language, a way of understanding the world. I smell the passage of time the way that others watch the changing colors of a sunset, distinguishing dozens of notes—rain dripping off leaves and filtering through moss, grass drying in the summer sun, the straw in the barns where we used to play hide-and-seek, the manure pile you pushed me into that time, or the branch of lilac blossoms you gave me on my sixteenth birthday.
The memories of our teenage years and our adult lives recall other odors. Did you know that your hands have a peppery scent, for example, something between brass, soap, and tobacco?
Take care of yourself, Anton, I hope you miss me, at least a little bit.
I’ll write to you again next week.
Fondly,
Alice
The following day a steady rain melted the snow. It was the first of several days that Can took Alice and Daldry around the city to see monuments such as the Topkapi Palace, the Süleymaniye Mosque, and the tombs of Süleyman and Roxelana. For hours on end they wandered the animated streets around the Galata Bridge and shopped in the Egyptian Bazaar. In the spice market, Alice stopped at each stall, breathing in the varied scents of the powders, dried flowers, and vials of essential oils. Daldry went into raptures at the sight of the intricately painted tiles in the Rüstem Pasha Mosque, and again before the frescoes in the former Church of the Holy Saviour in Chora. Only on one occasion, when they were in an old neighborhood where the timeworn wooden houses had escaped the great fires, did Alice feel ill at ease and ask to go elsewhere. She later took Daldry to the top of the Galata Tower, which she had first visited without him.
For Alice, the most memorable visit was a morning trip to the Flower Passage and its covered market, followed by lunch in a charming little waterside restaurant. On Thursday they toured the Dolmabahçe neighborhood, and on Friday they went to Eyüp, a district stretching from the Golden Horn to the Black Sea. After admiring the tomb of the Prophet Mohammed’s companion Abu Ayyub, they walked up the steps to the cemetery and paused for a drink at the Pierre Loti Café. From the windows of the old house where the French author came to relax, one could see over the Ottoman tombs to the broad horizon and the shores of the Bosporus beyond.
It was here, during a moment alone, that Alice confided in Daldry and told him that she thought the time had come to start thinking about returning to London.
“You want to give up?”
“We came in the wrong season. We should have waited at least for the flowers to bloom before rushing over. Besides, if I ever want to be able to pay you for all the costs we’ve incurred, I’ve got to get back to work. This has been an extraordinary journey, and I’ll go home my head buzzing with new ideas, but I have to turn them into something concrete.”
“You know full well that we didn’t come here for your perfumes.”
“That’s not true . . . I’m not sure what brought me here. Was it the fortune-teller? My nightmares? Your insistence? The opportunity to escape my daily life for a while? In the beginning, I wanted to believe that my parents had come to Istanbul. The idea of following in their footsteps made them seem closer. But we haven’t heard anything from the consulate, and it’s time I started acting like an adult. Even if my entire being is resisting it, I have to face the facts. So do you, for that matter.”
“I disagree. I admit we may have overestimated the consul’s capacities, but think about the life the fortune-teller promised, about the man waiting at the end of your journey. I’m the one who promised to take you to him, or at least to the second link in the chain. I’m a man of honor. I keep my promises. It’s out of the question to give up in the face of adversity. We haven’t lost any time. On the contrary, you have new ideas, and I’m sure others will soon follow. One of these days we’ll find that second person.”
“Be reasonable. I’m not asking for us to go home tomorrow—I just think we should start thinking about it.”
“I’ve thought about it. And since you ask, I’ll think about it some more.”
As Daldry spoke, Can returned, cutting short their conversation. It was time to go back to the hotel.
Day in and day out, from churches to synagogues, from synagogues to mosques, from sleepy old cemeteries to lively streets, and in the tearooms and restaurants where they ate every evening, Alice, Daldry, and Can shared a little more about themselves and about their pasts. Daldry and Can had come to an understanding. A certain camaraderie had even developed between them, thanks to their common endeavor.
The following Monday, the hotel concierge caught Alice’s attention as she was returning from a busy day in the city to tell her a consular courier had delivered a message at the end of the morning.
Alice turned to Daldry with feverish excitement.
“Well, go on. Open it.”
“Not here. Let’s go to the bar.”
They took a table at the back of the room, and Daldry sent away the approaching waiter.
“So?” He was bubbling over with impatience.
Alice pulled open the flap, read the few lines of text, and put the note on the table.
Daldry looked back and forth between Alice and the telegram.
“It would be indelicate of me to read your private correspondence, but it’s cruel to make me wait a second longer.”
“What time is it?”
“Five o’clock. Why?”
“Because the consul is about to show up at any minute.”
“Here?”
“That’s what he says. He has something he wants to tell me.”
“Well, in that case, I’ll leave you to it.”
Daldry started to get up, but Alice put her hand on his arm to show he could stay. She didn’t have to ask twice.
A short while later, the consul walked into the lobby, saw Alice in the bar, and came to meet her.
“You received my message in time,” he said, taking off his coat, which he passed, along with his hat, to the waiter. He took a seat in a club chair between the two of them.
“Something to drink?” asked Daldry.
The consul glanced at his watch and asked for a bourbon, which the waiter swiftly brought to him.
“I’ve got an appointment in the neighborhood in about half an hour. The consulate isn’t far, as you know, and since I had news for you, I thought I’d deliver it in person.”
“That’s very kind of you,” said Alice.
“As I had anticipated, our friends the Turks weren’t much help. It’s not that they didn’t want to be helpful. A connection of mine at the Turkish equivalent of our Foreign Office called me the day before yesterday to say that they had tried everything, but that visa requests from the old Ottoman days were never even archived.”
“A dead end,” said Daldry.
“Not quite. I happened to ask one of my intelligence officers to look into your affair. He’s a young fellow, but extremely effective. He said that with a bit of luck—for us, not them, of course—one of your parents might have lost their passport during their stay, or perhaps had it stolen. If you think Istanbul is chaotic today, I assure you it was far worse forty years ago. H
ad this been the case, your parents would have certainly gone to what was, back then, the British Embassy.”
“Somebody stole their passports?” Daldry was more impatient than ever.
“No, I’m afraid not.” The consul swirled his drink in its tumbler, making the ice cubes tinkle. “However, they did come to the embassy during their stay. Your parents were in Istanbul, not in 1909 or 1910, as you initially thought, but at the end of 1913. Your father was finishing a study on Turkish medicinal plants for his pharmacology degree. They lived in a little apartment in Beyoğlu, not far from here, as it happens.”
“How did you learn all that?” asked Daldry.
“Well, I don’t have to remind you of the chaotic state of affairs leading up to the beginning of the war in August 1914, or the unfortunate decision made by the Ottoman rulers in November to side with Germany and the Central Powers. As subjects of His Majesty, your parents found themselves, ipso facto, enemies of the Turkish regime. Your father anticipated the risk he and his wife were taking and signaled their presence to the embassy in hopes that they might be repatriated. Alas, in wartime, travel was not without risk, and they had to wait a long time before they were able to return to England. Their request to take refuge in the embassy in the event of an emergency created a paper trail that allows me to tell you all this today.”
Alice’s face had grown progressively paler as she listened to the consul’s story. Daldry was beginning to worry about her.
“Are you all right?” he asked, taking her hand.
“Should we call a doctor?” asked the consul.
“No, it’s nothing. I’m fine,” she murmured, trembling slightly. “Please, do go on.”
“In the spring of 1916, our embassy managed to exfiltrate about a hundred British citizens by hiding them aboard a cargo ship flying the Spanish flag. Spain was a neutral power, and the ship made it all the way to Gibraltar without a scratch. From that point onward I don’t have any information, but your presence here today would seem to indicate that they made it home safe and sound.” He took a sip of his drink. “Now you know as much as I do, Miss Pendelbury.”